158 



peaceful possession between bordering nations. It is cus- 

 tomary to consider the whole southern b,ank of the Japura 

 as Spanish, from the Salto Grande as far as the inland delta 

 of the Abatiparana, where, on the northern bank of the 

 Amazon, a marco de limites is placed, a stone which the 

 Portuguese astronomers found in lat. 2° 20 7 , and long. 

 6.9° 32 ' . {Manuscript Map of the Amazon, by Don Francisco 

 Requena, commissary of limits to his Catholic Majesty, 1783.) 

 The Spanish missions of Japura or Caqueta, commonly 

 called missions des Andaquies, extend no farther than Rio 

 Caguan, a tributary stream of the Japura, below the de- 

 stroyed mission of S. Francisco Solano. All the west of 

 the Japura, south of the equator, from the Rio de los Enga- 

 nos and the Great Cataract, is in the possession of the 

 natives and the Portuguese. The latter have some small 

 settlements at Tabocas, S. Juaquin de Cuerana, and Curatus 

 the second of which is on the south of the Japura, the third 

 on it's northern tributary stream, the Apoporis *. According 

 to the Portuguese astronomers, it was at the mouth of the 

 Apoporis, in lat. 1° 14' south, long. 17° 58', (west of the 

 meridian of Paris), that the Spanish commissioners were 

 willing to place the stone of the limits in 1780, which de- 

 noted an intention of not preserving the marco of Abatipa- 

 rana. The Portuguese commissaries opposed taking the 

 Apoporis for the frontier, asserting, that, in order to cover 

 the Brazilian possessions on the Rio Negro, the new 

 marco ought to be placed at the Salto Grande del Japura 

 (south lat. 0° 33', long. 75° 0'). In Putumayo or 19a, the 

 most southern Spanish missions (missiones baxas), governed 

 by the ecclesiastics of Popayan and Pasto, do not extend as 

 far as the confluence of the Amazon, but only to 2° 20 ' of 

 south latitude, where the small villages of Marive, S. Ramon, 

 and Asumpcion, are situate. The Portuguese are masters 



* See above, Vol. v, p. 336—339. 



